Dmitri Erland
Dmitri Erland, also known as Sage Darnel, was temporarily a narrator in Cinder and Cress and was one of the supporting characters in The Lunar Chronicles. Basic information Dr. Erland was the leading scientist of the letumosis research team in New Beijing Palace. In Cinder, he was employed by the Eastern Commonwealth to find a cure for the plague. He once had a wife and daughter; his daughter was born a shell and thus taken away from him according to Lunar law. This event prompted him to escape Luna and to find the true Lunar heir to displace Queen Levana so that the infanticide would stop. He created the cyborg draft in order to find Princess Selene, which greatly distressed Cinder. Story Dr. Erland is actually a Lunar fugitive, who works in the palace as a letumosis researcher. He tests his antidote on Cinder by injecting the disease into her but learns that she is immune to the disease, and he performs a test to find out that she is 36.28% not human. He offers Cinder first access to a letumosis antidote for her sister, Peony, in exchange for her to stay as a "volunteer" for him to learn more about her immunity to letumosis. Dr. Erland visits Cinder in jail before he leaves for Africa, giving her a new cyborg hand and foot so that she may escape and reveals her birthright. At the end, he leaves for Africa, where the first outbreak of letumosis came from, to further his research for a cure. He states that he had a daughter, Crescent Moon, who was a shell. He believes her to be dead, and said that "she would be about your age now" to Cinder. Dr. Erland's sudden disappearance, along with security footage of his glamour and assistance with Cinder's escape from jail, gives suspicions that he is in fact Lunar. He was previously wanted as a crown traitor by the Eastern Commonwealth. Dr. Erland returns in Cress, continuing his research for a cure for letumosis in the African village Farafra. He only accepted Lunars as test subjects for the cure, and he was said to be picky about them. When Cress was kidnapped, she was taken and sold to Dr. Erland. At first glance, Dr. Erland immediately recognized Cress as his long-lost daughter because of her sky-blue eyes that are similar to his and her hair color and freckles that resembles her mother. During their infiltration of New Beijing Palace on the wedding day, Dr. Erland was in the research labs with Thorne trying to get Thorne's stem cells into a solution of eye drops to cure his blindness. He succeeds in this, but when he is finished he discovers blood blisters on his arms, a sign of the mutated form of letumosis that Lunars are no longer immune to. He orders Thorne to leave and quarantines himself. Before making their escape, Cinder, Thorne, Cress, and Wolf visit him for a final time, where he admits to being Cress's father and apologizes to her for giving her up at birth, and tells her that he loves her. After a tearful parting, he is confronted by Queen Levana and her entourage, but dies within minutes. Features Dr. Erland was an old man with "a bald spot surrounded by thin, messy hair" and "eyes bluer than the sky" with an impish grin. He sounded to be rather skinny and short. He normally wore a "gray newsboy cap" and a white lab coat. Trivia *Dr. Erland's Earthen surname (Erland) was an anagram for his real surname, "Darnel." References Category:A to Z Category:Characters Category:Supporting characters Category:Males Category:Humans Category:Lunars Category:Alive Category:Characters in Cinder Category:Characters in Cress Category:Viewpoint characters Category:Deceased Category:Letumosis patients